Jefferies Financial Group Increases Accenture (NYSE:ACN) Price Target to $385.00

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) had its price objective boosted by investment analysts at Jefferies Financial Group from $355.00 to $385.00 in a research report issued to clients and investors on Friday,Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has a “hold” rating on the information technology services provider’s stock. Jefferies Financial Group’s price objective suggests a potential upside of 5.09% from the company’s current price.

Several other brokerages also recently issued reports on ACN. StockNews.com raised Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, December 9th. UBS Group increased their price objective on shares of Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday. Mizuho upped their target price on Accenture from $352.00 to $365.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, September 18th. Citigroup lifted their price target on Accenture from $350.00 to $405.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, September 17th. Finally, Bank of America upped their price objective on Accenture from $365.00 to $388.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fourteen have given a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $383.23.

Accenture Stock Down 1.6 %

Shares of ACN stock opened at $366.37 on Friday. The business has a 50 day moving average of $360.47 and a two-hundred day moving average of $337.49. The company has a market cap of $229.04 billion, a P/E ratio of 32.05, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture has a 52 week low of $278.69 and a 52 week high of $387.51.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.83% and a net margin of 11.20%. The firm had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. During the same period last year, the company earned $3.27 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis. Analysts expect that Accenture will post 12.74 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture declared that its board has approved a stock repurchase plan on Thursday, September 26th that authorizes the company to buyback $4.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the information technology services provider to purchase up to 1.8% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are often an indication that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

Insider Transactions at Accenture

In related news, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $343.70, for a total value of $1,096,746.70. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 6 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,062.20. The trade was a 99.81 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 9,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, October 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $376.16, for a total value of $3,385,440.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 20,324 shares in the company, valued at approximately $7,645,075.84. This represents a 30.69 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders have sold 36,298 shares of company stock valued at $13,372,661. 0.07% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Accenture

A number of hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in ACN. Morse Asset Management Inc bought a new stake in Accenture in the third quarter valued at $25,000. Strategic Financial Concepts LLC acquired a new position in Accenture in the second quarter valued at about $28,000. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. bought a new stake in Accenture during the third quarter worth about $30,000. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 607.1% in the third quarter. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC now owns 99 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $35,000 after acquiring an additional 85 shares during the last quarter. Finally, RPg Family Wealth Advisory LLC bought a new stake in Accenture during the 3rd quarter worth approximately $39,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

About Accenture

Accenture plc, a professional services company, provides strategy and consulting, industry X, song, and technology and operation services worldwide. The company offers application services, including agile transformation, DevOps, application modernization, enterprise architecture, software and quality engineering, data management; intelligent automation comprising robotic process automation, natural language processing, and virtual agents; and application management services, as well as software engineering services; strategy and consulting services; data and analytics strategy, data discovery and augmentation, data management and beyond, data democratization, and industrialized solutions comprising turnkey analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) solutions; metaverse; and sustainability services.